The present invention relates to the field of hand tools, and more specifically to hand-wielded implements for removing bound staples from stapled documents or other layered materials.
Fastening and unfastening layered document pages and the like have long been necessary tasks in both business and residential settings. A century ago, such work was delegated to sturdy, sharply pointed pins somewhat more substantial than a florist's stick pins and tailor's straight pins currently in use. Document pins generally were elongated with one end bent into a T-shape or L-configuration so as to provide a blunt pushing surface. With one hand, usually employing a bare thumb or other finger, a user would press against the blunt pushing surface so as to puncture through layered documents from a front side to a backside thereof. Next, using bare fingers of the other hand, the pin would be pressed and forcibly redirected for a return pass entirely through the layered document, thus delivering its sharp point exit at the front of the layers.
The result would be that the document pages would be snuggly secured, although a clearly hazardous pin point would remain conspicuously exposed. Injuries from this practice and from its hazardous result were common, often to the extent that bloodstains on the fastened documents were not uncommon.
In subsequent years, mechanical staplers were developed, thus putting an end to the hazardous pinning method. The most common staple design continues to be a segment of wire configured so as to have two short, generally parallel legs interconnected by a slightly longer wire bridge. Often the staple legs are sharpened at their tips. These staples are loaded into a stapling machine and dispensed manually or mechanically on demand.
Table model staplers were popular for decades, performing as static stapling stations. These were soon joined by small, portable (non-static) hand-wielded versions that would be moved to the stapling target. More recently, stapling has most often been performed automatically by auxiliary stapling units mounted on high volume photocopiers. Stapling technology has made great advancement while the staples themselves have seen little or no change. While stapling techniques have become safer and more efficient, staple-related injuries have continued, especially during un-stapling (staple removal) efforts.
Staple pulling since early times continues to be a manual effort. Staple removal implements ranged from a user's thumbnails to a handy pocketknife or letter opener. Of course, these techniques induced injuries, as well. In the relatively recent past, specialty hand tools have been developed for removing staples. Custom staple-pullers are presented either as an integral feature of handheld staplers or more frequently as standalone devices.
Handheld staple removers are available in various designs. Most common are the hand powered variety, often including either a wedging blade or cooperative prong elements to spread and lift the staple. Single blade staple removers are often constructed by machining, casting, or forging metal into a blade sized for insertion beneath a staple bridge portion. The blade may be progressively narrower at its leading tip so that its movement under the staple bridge serves to slightly lift the staple bridge and then to push it away from the document layers in a camming action, thus unbending and extracting the staple legs.
Jaw type extractors or pullers with opposed prongs or tips extending from a common hinge are also shaped such that they effectively narrow toward their tips so that their insertion beneath the staple bridge initially lifts the bridge slightly, then pushes and spreads it away in a camming action so as to unbend and extract the staple legs. Hence, the staple is essentially pushed or wedged out of its fixed engagement. With either tool, blade or jaw type, the removed staples will remain jammed upon the remover blade or jaw tips, or they simply take flight.
So, while advancements in stapling technology have all but eliminated the hazards involved in fastening pages or other materials together, there have been no effective improvements in the manual staple removal process, particularly since the removed staples must ultimately be manually handled and disposed of one-at-a-time. The most exasperating issue is that the removed staples too often are left scattered on workspace desks, tables, and carpets, or tenaciously wedged on the staple remover itself. These used staples remain as sharp as when first applied, ready to wreak injury to the user's hands or clothing.
The broken, jammed or clinging staple can cause painful damage to the user's fingers and to the device itself, as well as to the documents or materials to which the staple is attached. Yet another problem with the currently available models is that they do not provide an efficient or effective built-in-storage facility for the removed staples. This results in a littering of the workplace and a menace to both the cleaning staff and the vacuum cleaners.
The prior art reflects a number of inventions developed to address some of these problems. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,957,430, issued on Sep. 28, 1999, to Olson, provides magnetic areas on the outside of a four-pronged staple remover, presumably to catch the ejected staple if it happens to land on one of the magnetic areas. However, there is some doubt as to the effectiveness of the Olson device. If the removed staple frees itself from clinging onto the large arm of the Olson device and does not land on the designated magnetic areas, it can fly out in any direction away from the magnets. Thus the primary problem—breaking, jamming, and clinging staples, as well as a lack of proper storage means—remains to be addressed.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,784,370, issued on Nov. 15, 1988, to Strickland provides a staple remover with a unique clamp for removing a broken staple. The Strickland concept appears reasonable in theory, but in practice problems continue to exist with respect to clinging staples and a lack of a storage facility for the removed staples.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,641,114B1 to Carmen, while disclosing an attractive round-bodied staple remover, does not address how the user will be able to view the staple and insert the teeth of the remover underneath the staple to successfully remove it from papers to which it is attached. For the user of the round-bodied staple remover, it is important that he/she sees that the teeth of the remover fit between the two legs of the staple without any guesswork. Thus, not only are the problems of broken, jammed, clinging and flying staples not addressed by Carmen, another problem is introduced by blocking the user's line of sight.
Thus, all conventional type staple removers that have two teeth/prongs on each of a pair of cooperating arms (where one of said cooperating arms is larger than the other) have at least three inherent problems: (1) the breaking of the staple while being removed; (2) the jamming of one leg of the staple in the papers, while being removed, and (3) the clinging of the staple onto the larger arm of the device.
The first two problems occur because the smaller of the cooperating arms of the staple remover (as in currently available models) is not always evenly centered within the receiving chamber of the larger arm (i.e., between puller prongs of the larger arm). The third problem occurs because of the length of the camming surface area of currently available models. On these conventional models, the camming area begins at the tip of the teeth/prongs and extends all the way to the chamber area. This kind of construction does not allow the removed staple to fall free into a channel section of the large arm, so it thus remains clinging on an arm of the staple remover.
Therefore, while numerous staple puller models have been introduced in the past, they all display the aforementioned design flaws and are thus unable to address the practical problems solved by the present invention. The present invention is based on the ideal of preventing problems before they occur, and it is designed in such a way that it prevents the aforementioned inherent problems of the conventional type staple removers currently in use. The inventive construction proposed herein is new and novel.
Accordingly, it is the primary object of the present invention to provide a staple remover that removes the staple without breaking it into pieces. It is a further principal object of the present invention to provide a staple remover that successfully removes staples without allowing them to cling to the papers or to the arms of the staple remover itself.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a box (shield) to prevent staples from escaping and littering the work area (and from endangering the user's eyes, hands, toes, etc.). It is still another object of the present invention to provide a shorter camming surface area in order to allow the removed staple to fall or be projected into a collector box area without clinging to the a remover arm.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a tray or drawer with a magnetic surface or magnetized portions that catch and collect removed staples for later removal and disposal, for example by withdrawing the tray through a convenient housing opening. A further object of the present invention is to crush or otherwise deform removed staples into different shapes and sizes in order to avoid having removed staples clinging to the papers or the staple remover's arms.
A further object of the present invention to enhance productivity and safety on the part of both the end-user and cleaning staffs of organizations (where applicable). Finally, it is an object of the present invention to create a staple remover that requires simple material and minimal labor, and that can easily be produced in a cost effective manner.
These and other objects of the present invention can be seen in detail by referring to the following specifications and technical drawings.